Ruling on Shuttered Post Offices Expected Soon

By

Jennifer Levitz

Jan. 24, 2011 1:33 p.m. ET

Closing post offices can be tricky—and has already landed the U.S. Postal Service in hot water.

The Postal Regulatory Commission expects to rule "very soon" on its investigation into whether the postal service has been improperly using reasons such as lease expirations to suspend service and to close many small, rural post offices, Norman Scherstrom, the spokesman for the commission, said Monday. The postal service has denied wrongdoing.

By law, in order to close a post office, the postal service must follow certain procedures to hear and weigh concerns of the community. The law also forbids closing a post office solely for economic reasons, meaning the postal service must cite other reasons, such as unsafe conditions, that don't include profitability. The postal service is lobbying Congress to change that law.

The regulatory commission, an independent oversight agency created by Congress and reporting to lawmakers, is reviewing more than 400 post offices where service was suspended in recent years to determine whether the suspensions were in fact illegal "de facto closings," Mr. Scherstrom said. In many cases, the postal service declared emergency suspensions based on expiring leases, and the post offices never reopened.

"A lease generally has a contract, and a date where you can expect it will end. For that to turn into an emergency seems odd," Mr. Scherstrom said.

The regulatory commission can't order post offices to be reopened, but it does pass its findings on to Congress, which can determine if further action is needed.

In the meantime, many communities where service was suspended are still fighting for their post offices.

"We are finding it hard to function without our post office," said Brian Van Nostrand, a 70-year-old potter in Hacker Valley, W.V., an Appalachian community of many artists and woodworkers. Service at the Hacker Valley post office was suspended in June of 2009, after more than 100 years.

The Hacker Valley post office was suspended "due to an eviction," meaning "the lease on the property was not extended or continued," postal service spokeswoman Joanne Veto said. The postal service acknowledged to the regulatory commission that it was notified three years earlier, in 2006, that the lease would not be renewed, according to documents filed with the commission.

The Hacker Valley post office was also in the red, costing the postal service $50,142 after revenue in 2009, according to the postal service.

Though service has not resumed, the Hacker Valley post office has still not been officially closed by the postal service. But in a recent interview postal executive Dean Granholm, vice president for delivery and post office operations, said hundreds of post offices where service has been suspended won't be reopening.

Hacker Valley merchants say being without a post office is hurting their trade, and they have even offered to build a new post office at their own expense, according to letters and petitions sent to the regulatory commission. The next-closest post office is in Diana, up a steep mountain road that is "all curves" and can take an hour, round trip, in the winter "if you can make it," said Webster County Sherriff Jerry Hamrick. "It's a dangerous drive."

Residents can also leave packages that are small enough to fit in their mailboxes, along with money, for the mail carrier. For larger packages, locals often wait at their mailboxes for the mail carrier, who can accept bigger packages in person. But the citizens say the mail carrier comes at varying times, and they can wind up waiting an hour in the cold to mail a package.

"It delays everything for us," said Steven Fisher, the manager of a custom cabinetry shop that mails packages almost daily. He added: "I'm aggravated. I just don't know why they shut us down."

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